
News
Our role in the New Hospital Programme
Learn how the Strategy Unit’s innovative model is transforming hospital planning by providing a consistent, data-driven approach to forecast future demand and evidence-based decision making.

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Our collective responsibility to share evaluation findings
The Strategy Unit is increasingly being commissioned to undertake evaluations on the pre
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Evaluating NHS England’s national approach to tackling healthcare inequalities
NHS England have commissioned the Strategy Unit to evaluate the national Core20PLUS5 approach for reducing healthcare inequalities.

News Evaluation and impact assessment | Policy
Menopause and the NHS workforce
Now with the World Menopause Day 2022 update. What is it like to experience menopause as an NHS employee? And what is its impact on both the individuals and the organisations they work for?

News Elective care | Inequalities | Policy | Strategy Development
Helping ICSs to reduce inequalities in access to planned care
Are there inequalities in access to planned care? If so, what are they? Which groups ‘gain’ and which groups suffer? And what could be done to address any inequalities? In pursuing their objective of reducing inequalities, what could Integrated Care Systems (ICSs) do? What strategies and approaches are likely to be successful?

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Blog: Strategies to reduce inequalities in planned care
MDSN responds to recent reports addressing the NHS waiting list crisis

News Futures thinking
‘Might’ is right
A good idea can be ruined by over-selling.

News Elective care | Inequalities
Strategies to reduce inequalities in access to planned hospital procedures
UPDATE 10th August: Now including briefing note for Integrated Care Boards on legal duties in respect of reducing inequalities. This report guides ICBs through the process.

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Appointing an ICS ‘Chief Analyst’
The Strategy Unit has, over the last ten years, developed a way of working that has allowed us to become recognised as a leading analytical organisation in the NHS.

News Better use of analysis
‘Developing your ICS Intelligence Functions’: A Free Webinar Series
What is an ‘Intelligence Function’? What value can they add to decision making? How can they be configured and who needs to be involved? What lessons can be drawn from current practice?

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Treating people on waiting lists: who decides what is fair?
Waiting lists for elective care are in the news. The national plan has been issued, with the expectation that lists will continue to rise for some years - and that long waiting will not disappear anytime soon. Addressing this ‘backlog’ will remain a fundamental challenge for some time to come.

News Better use of analysis | Futures thinking | Learning and development
Decision makers can make much better use of analysis
Part of the Strategy Unit mission is to improve the use of analysis in decision making. Current use is, to employ a euphemism, variable.

News Better use of analysis | Comparative Analysis | Elective care | Finance and payments | Problem Structuring
Strategy Unit devises a new method for classifying outpatient appointments
The number of outpatient attendances in England is now approaching 100 million each year.

News Evaluation and impact assessment | Learning and development | Public health and prevention
Share your good practice in increasing vaccine uptake
The Strategy Unit will undertake a rapid qualitative project to identify, collate and share, good practice across England in increasing COVID-19 vaccine uptake.

Blog post Complex Modelling | Emergency care | Inequalities
Strategy Unit analysis published showing changes in use of emergency departments under lockdown
We know that patterns of access to healthcare have changed during the pandemic.

News Elective care | Emergency care | Evaluation and impact assessment | Mental health | Primary, community and social care services
Evaluating Artificial Intelligence: a significant new win
The Strategy Unit, the Health Economics Unit and Leicester Clinical Trials Unit have been announced as evaluation partners to support success in the Artificial Intelligence (AI) in Health and Care Awards.

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A learning NHS and ‘black box’ analysis aren’t compatible
Data analysis presents a limitless opportunity to improve decision making within the NHS.

Blog post Futures thinking | Policy
The bigger picture
Today, the Health Foundation launched the REAL Centre (Research and Economic Analysis for the Long term), an incredibly important initiative to imp

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Time to act for sex and gender parity in health and care
On International Womens Day 2019, Abeda Mulla from the Strategy Unit reflects on our gendered society that has led to poorer health outcomes in women.

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Why community alternatives to hospital admission don’t (typically) reduce total admission levels
Repeatedly, published evaluations show that community/primary care services interventions with a stated intention to reduce total (or forecast total) emergency admissions to hospital don’t achieve the expected result**